Equity is simply the difference between the debt held on a property (based on Aussie’s mortgage data), against what the property is currently valued at (according to CoreLogic).

Burnside is the top council area where home equity is worth an average of 48.7 per cent or $268,886*, followed by Campbelltown (48.6 per cent) and Prospect (47.4 per cent).

Top 10 and Bottom 10 council regions in South Australia – percentage and dollar values

The report shows that Adelaide’s inner eastern and northern suburbs are generally the highest equity earning regions, while homes in Whyalla have recorded a significantly lower home equity percentage of 25.9 per cent, worth $52,664, preceded by Playford (31.5 per cent) and Salisbury (31.6 per cent).

Executive Chairman of Aussie, Mr John Symond, said “The areas showing the highest accrual of home equity were typically located around Adelaide’s blue chip inner city suburbs.

“I believe the best investment both for security and lifestyle is still real estate and I see no reason why this will change over the next decade, especially in view of the lower interest rate climate, lack of housing supply in the major cities and continuing population growth”, he added.

Property prices across the Adelaide metro area have risen by an annual compound rate of 7 per cent over the last 20 years.

South Australian homes are now ranked fifth highest in home equity levels across Australia’s states and territories, measuring an average rate of 39.4 per cent, equating to $136,918 worth of equity.&nbsp;

Average level of home equity – state by state percentages and dollar values

Mr Tim Lawless, Research Director of CoreLogic RP Data, said “The outer fringes of Adelaide’s metropolitan area typically show lower levels of home equity. A major factor in the equity stakes is that the longer a property has been owned, the more time owners have had to experience price growth and reduce their mortgages”.

Average level of home equity – city by city in percentage and dollar terms

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The fine print

*Equity was calculated by selecting all those properties for which we know the level of debt outstanding using Aussie’s loan book (as at December 2015). For these properties, we used the current valuation estimate of each property using CoreLogic’s automated valuation process and subtracted the amount of debt outstanding. The resulting equity amount can be expressed in both percentage terms and dollar value terms. The result provides a benchmark estimate of equity levels across the council regions of Australia. Regions with fewer than 25 mortgages held with an Aussie panel lender were considered to be statistically unreliable were excluded from the analysis. NT and ACT have been included on a capital city level only, and the ACT does not have council areas.